Blog posts tagged 'marathon'

Charnwood Marathon 22nd March 2014

Just 6 weeks to go before the Thames Path 100-miler and despite having almost no clue how to train properly for it, the one thing that seems obvious is getting time on feet.  I thought I'd take advantage of a chance to visit the folks in Leics and take in the Charnwood Marathon on the Saturday and the Loughborough half on the Sunday.  It seems slightly selfish to spend most of the weekend away d…

St. Peter's Way Ultra - 45 Miles

As the days until the Thames Path 100 disappear at an alarming rate of knots this was to be an essential training run.  It wasn't in the original plan but stepped in as understudy to the Country to Capital which I lost to injury.  I'd never heard of the race, maybe because it had only been run once, but found it on the UK Ultra Marathon Running site - a great resource but they don't half make yo…

EnduranceLife Devon Ultra

It was always going to be ambitious scheduling this race, classified as 'severe' by EnduranceLife, just a week after the Thames Trot.  When I entered, the plan was still packing in the long stuff for the Thames Path 100 early to leave a shot at a decent London Marathon in between.  As last year's soleus tear injury has dragged on those plans have had to change. The London Marathon has been downg…

Thames Trot 50 - 1st February 2014

The original plan had this as my second ultra of the year, the first being the Country to Capital but the same team, GoBeyond. However, the soleus tear which wiped out the last couple of months of 2013 hadn't healed in time to risk that one so after a scant 3 weeks of training - and pretty low volume training at that - I'm on the 6:38 from Slough heading to Oxford Station. If I wasn't trying to ge…

2014 Race Programme

Total cock up with the Loughborough Half - I thought it was the 23rd Feb when I booked it! So that's looking dodgy!I'd love to go for a full-on effort in London but it's only 3 weeks before a 100.  I'm hoping that as that's so much slower-paced that's long enough to recover.  I will try to keep some speedwork going throughout and up it from March for London.  Reckon you hang on to endurance so …

2014 is shaping up to be a year of challenges

There's still plenty of 2013 to go and a target marathon to attack in 10 days but I've started filling out 2014's diary.  Looking at the races already booked in I can't help but think these are distances and challenges I couldn't and wouldn't have even considered a couple of years ago and yet here they are back to back!Something seems to have switched in my head and the more outlandish runs are n…

The 2013 Comrades Ultra

So this is it. Sunday starts at 3am and we have to be in the start pen by 5:15am otherwise you start from the back. We have a taxi ordered and experience of Durban cabbies has made us extremely dubious of any promises they make, even in standard office hours, let lone crack of dawn runs into the centre of town.  But, we seem to end up picking cabs from the same company over the past few days and …

Woodhouse Challenge 13.5M May Bank Holiday Monday

Despite taking this one easy as I'd run 38 miles 2 days before and that the scenery was at least as good as the Oxon 40, I failed to bring my phone so all photos herein are stolen.  I've pinched a couple from the race web site and I hope to blag one or two more from @mikew30 who was far better organised than me. This race rounded off a fabulous bank holiday weekend of running.  Not one I'd heard…

Oxon 40 - Saturday 4th May

I decided on the Oxon 40 as the lastlong training run for the Comrades. It's local being just past and around Henley and compared to the alternatives available on the same day it was incredibly cheap at just £12. The sort of price you might expect to hear from your Grandparents in the context of 'eee I remember when races were just £12, and bread was 3d and we all had to live in a shoebox'. …

Eve of the Comrades

Tomorrow I'll be on a plane bound for Johannesburg, fretting I've brought the wrong shoes and whether I'll make the cigarette-paper thin connecting window in Paris.I've been thinking about this race since I entered it last September but right now I can think of nothing else; it has completely taken over my life.  Despite all this thought I've still no clear idea how to tackle it.I've run many ove…